The Connection between Pain and Change

When thinking of pain we always think “this will pass”, “it won’t last long”, but what about the pain that does last. Not the physical, the one that causes all the aches, but the pain that is mental. Mental pain can stick on for a while or even forever. The topic of pain can go with change as well; no matter how much a person changes, that pain can still stick with them. The question is, how do we deal with such pain? This brings me to The Dew Breaker by Edwidge Danticat, she uses several different characters and stories to show the connection between pain and change.

I want to start out with a little bit of a summary of the book as whole and dig deeper into the theory of the connection between pain and change. The first story, titled, The Book of the Dead is the first to show the connection of change and pain. We first are drawn into the story by the description of Ka’s father, a man who does not speak much of his past.

“‘We have a proverb,’ he continues. ‘One day for the hunter, one day for the prey. Ka, your father was the hunter, he was not the prey.’” (page 21).

This is when we first learn of the bad things that have happened in his past. By the end of the book in the chapter called The Dew Breaker, we learn more than we thought. We know that Ka’s father has a part in each short story in the book, causing pain for others or experiencing his own pain. One story is about a boy whose parents were killed by the dew breaker (Ka’s father), another is from the point of view of his wife who has some pains and secrets of her own.

I mentioned above the dew breakers wife, who we learn was related to the man that caused the scar on the dew breakers face. During the short story from her point of view we learn of the pain she has been experiencing since she was a child.

“The cemetery was on both sides of them now, the headstones glistening in the evening light. She held her breath the way she imagined the way her brother did before the weight of the sea collapsed his small lungs and when he was forced to surrender to the water, sinking into the world of starfishes, sea turtles, weeds, and sharks. She had gone nowhere near the sea since her brother had disappeared; her heart raced even when she happened upon images of waves on television.” (pg. 71).

We can see from this quote that Anne, the dew breakers wife, has experienced a lot of pain in her life. Once we read the last chapter we learn of the death of her other brother, the Priest, whom was killed by her later husband.

In an article that speaks of pain there is a great quote that talks about how one can grow from the pain they experienced.

“Chronic pain does not require constant remaking of the world and of the self because it creates a new state of being: one becomes a person who lives with pain rather than a person or body in pain.” (Pain, My Kin, by Travis Chi Wing Lau).

Now Travis takes a different point of view than I thought of. He thinks of pain as a part of himself, as something he can control, he says “Pain’s terms are my terms, after all.” If we are to think of pain in our own terms, we could possibly change ourselves for the better. Which I personally think Ka’s father has done. He may have been a bad guy back in Haiti but in America he reinvented himself, he became a loving father and a loving husband. Change can be a touchy subject though. I am sure we all know someone who said they would change themselves and they never do, they just keep repeating all the terrible things they said they would stop. I do not know if the pain they have experienced has made them unable to change. Maybe different types of pain affect the way a person becomes, but if we look at pain the way that Travis Chi Wing Lau looks at it, then maybe we can change our pain and change yourself while at it.

Overall, I believe that there is a strong connection between pain and change. If you change the way you look at your pain, you can change the way you perceive the world and yourself. While this book has many great themes and important topics in it like racism against Haitians, I took pain as the main theme. Danticat does a great job at showing the challenges that people can face/do face, as well as making sure to talk about the Haitian culture which experiences pain. The police brutality and the racism are both painful to read about and to write about, which brings me to the admiration I have for Danticat to be able to write such powerful, meaningful thoughts. I do not know much about Danticat, but these stories make me wonder if she has ever experienced pain like these characters in her book. I find it easier to write and read a story when you have a certain connection to someone.

Danticat, E. (2005). The dew breaker (1st Vintage Contemporaries ed.). New York: Vintage

Books.

Chi Wing Lau, Travis. “Pain, My Kin.” BREVITY’s Nonfiction Blog, 21 Sept. 2020, brevity.wordpress.com/2020/09/21/pain-my-kin/.

Haitian Flag https://libertyflagandbanner.com/product/haiti-flag-seal/

The Dew Breaker https://www.target.com/p/the-dew-breaker-vintage-contemporaries-by-edwidge-danticat-paperback/-/A-76945225

Woman with scar https://www.pinterest.com/pin/41165784067469986/

Haitian beach https://www.decameron.com/en/otr-destinations/haiti/arcadins-coast/royal-decameron-indigo-beach-resort-spa

Danticat https://www.worldliteraturetoday.org/2019/winter/bearing-unforgivable-tribute-edwidge-danticat-achy-obejas

Second Danticat https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/3525.Edwidge_Danticat